Category Archives: Sports

Destroying Some People by Paying College Athletes

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Destroying Some People

Reggie Bush says paying college athletes will result in destroying some people screams the rather misleading headline. The idea that athletes will soon be paid for their name, image, and likeness (NIL) is the basis for the article. While Bush’s statement is accurate, the gist of his point is about how young athletes coming into large amounts of money will attract those who hope to steal it.

The point here is the headline is completely misrepresenting what Bush is saying. The inference from the headline is Bush is against paying young college athletes based on the idea it will be destroying some people. In reality he is simply stating a fact. If young athletes, or any person, comes into a fairly large amount of money and they don’t have a solid financial background, unsavory people will attempt to steal that money and it has the potential to be damaging.

Now, I’d like to get a little deeper into an analysis of this simple fact. Many people, not Bush to be clear, will use this premise to argue against young athletes receiving money for their NIL. We are protecting this poor, helpless athlete from the terrible dangers of having her or his money stolen and life destroyed. Who is the we? That is the important question for me. The answer is simple enough, we isn’t the one being paid, it’s someone else on their self-righteous pedestal. That is really all you need to know.

The person to be paid needs to be protected by not paying them. We’ll take care of you because there is danger in being wealthy. You’re just not old enough, wise enough, careful enough, wary enough so we’ll watch out for you. This is the paternalistic nonsense that both politicians and those who want to control our lives spout almost continuously. We know what is better for you than you do yourself.

The danger lies in the fact they are sometimes quite correct. This destroying some people by the sudden accumulation of wealth is no idle fantasy. It happens. There are several options here and if you read Bush’s comments in full, he goes into them with great clarity.

His main suggestion is that young athletes be given a solid financial foundation from which they will be able to properly manage their newfound wealth. This is, without question, the best course of action. Another option is to simply give them the money and some percentage will fall victim to rogues. The final option is to tell them they just are not capable of managing the money and therefore you are doing them a favor by prohibiting them from having it.

When you examine these three options with a clear mind, it is obvious the third choice, withholding the money, is far and away the must unethical and disgusting. The terrible part is this is exactly what we’ve been doing for the last who knows how many years. Even worse, I’m sure you can find any number of people who will still argue it right now and they’ll think Bush was doing the same. He wasn’t.

Let people make their own mistakes while giving them as many tools as you can to make good decisions. This is the only correct answer.

Tom Liberman

Kris Bryant and the Cubs test Libertarian Ideals

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Kris Bryant

There’s been an interesting story in the sports world involving Chicago Cub slugger Kris Bryant that has been simmering for five years. Bryant was a highly-touted young rookie for the Cubs that season but they kept him in the minor leagues for two weeks starting the season. This denial means Bryant must wait until 2021 to be a free agent and sign an enormous contract, rather than doing so this year.

Bryant lost an arbitration case in which he argued the Cubs made their move solely to deny him a year of service while the Cubs argue the two weeks were necessary seasoning for Bryant before being called to the major league club. As is my way, let us dispense with all nonsense. The Cubs kept him in the minor leagues back in 2015 for the sole-purpose of getting an extra year out of him without paying free agent prices. The argument the Cubs put forward is a lie. This is not the subject of my blog today.

What I want to examine is the Libertarian ideology that people, or organizations, generally do what is in their best interest. It can be argued the Cubs did what was in their best interest by holding back Bryant for two weeks. They basically got his services for almost the entire season and gained an extra year by doing so. However, Bryant is angry about it and has refused all long-term contracts the Cubs offered him. He wants out because he feels they cheated him. That is clearly not in the interest of the Cubs.

My beloved St. Louis Cardinals have a history of not resorting to this particular methodology as a way to keep players under contract. Often times, but not always, the player eventually signs a long-term contract under reasonable terms with the Cardinals. It can be argued that the strategy employed by both the Cardinals and Cubs is in their best interest. This is a problem with Libertarian Ideology in regards to enlightened self-interest.

We don’t always know what is in our best interest in the long run. It is also clear what is in the best interest of one side is not always in the best interest of the other, in this case Bryant and the Cubs are at odds over the subject.

Sometimes people and organizations behave in self-destructive ways that are not in their own interest. Where does this leave a Libertarian such as myself?

I understand that enlightened self-interest isn’t a line that can easily drawn and that sometimes it is impossible to do so. The question for me is if the arbitration committee gets to make that decision. Do they get to say the Cubs acted illegally and grant Bryant free agency immediately?

Major League baseball and the player’s union came up with a system. The Cubs manipulated that system. Bryant is the victim. It was a crappy thing for the Cubs to do to him but they followed the agreed upon system and that is really all we have to make any final determinations. Can a better system be implemented? Likely. Proceed to do so.

Tom Liberman

Was Golfer Ryan Palmer Wrong to Cause a Long Wait?

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Ryan Palmer and the Long Wait

There’s an interesting story this week in the golfing world related to a long wait at the end of the 2020 Sony Open. Ryan Palmer hit a shot that looked like it went out of bounds; rather than playing a provisional ball, he chose to go look for his original and then, when it couldn’t be found, went back and played a second shot. This while the tournament leaders had a long wait of forty minutes on the final hole.

Normally when a player hits a shot like Palmer’s they will play a provisional ball so that, if the original can’t be found, they can immediately go to that one and continue play. Palmer chose not to do this which caused the long wait because he had to go back, setup and hit another shot, then finish the hole. The controversy is bigger because the two players waiting behind him were the leaders and such a long wait can, obviously, disrupt your round. In fact, one of the players hit a poor shot and wound up losing the tournament.

Palmer heard some angry opinions about his decision but remains, at the time I’m writing this article, unapologetic. He has stated that he’d do it the same way again in the future.

Let’s first get rid of the notion that I, or anyone else, knows better what Palmer should have done than he himself. It was his decision to make and he made it. Hitting a provisional ball in that situation is completely optional and he was not required to do so.

That being said, let’s talk about what a reasonable person might have done and if it’s permissible to criticize Palmer.

The entire purpose of hitting a provisional ball is to alleviate the wait of competitors behind you. It’s the polite thing to do. This was the final hole of a tournament and Palmer was well-aware the two players behind him were vying for the tournament lead. At the time he made his decision he was still in contention himself although the penalty he incurred from his wayward stroke dropped him down the leaderboard.

There is no doubt in my mind that a polite golfer would have taken the provisional ball. That even in the heat of the moment a golfer who neglected to do so would offer up a mea culpa and apologize to the golfers affected by the decision.

Palmer is choosing to be impolite. He chose to ignore the possibility of the lost ball and potentially inconvenience the players behind him. There is absolutely nothing wrong with people saying exactly that. Just as it is Palmer’s right to be unapologetic.

People are allowed to be rude and they don’t have to apologize but you get to, going forward, treat them appropriately based on that knowledge, that’s your decision. The other competitors on the PGA tour can deal with Palmer in any way they want, Patrick Reed is learning that lesson, or not learning it, even as we speak.

Tom Liberman

Congress Tries to Save Minor League Baseball

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Minor League Baseball

A bi-partisan group of legislators from the United States Congress is angry that Major League Baseball is losing money on their Minor League System and wants to eliminate 42 teams. The reason members of Congress are mad is because the teams headed for oblivion are in their districts. So what? You might say if you have Libertarian leanings. What can Congress do? Plenty, and that’s the problem.

Congress has the ability to make or break a business by passing legislation and that is not what the Founding Fathers wanted and it is not a power Congress should have. What can they do? They might refuse to grant visas to international players, they might change broadcasting rights to not allow teams to have exclusive home territorial rights, they could even repeal Major League Baseball’s antitrust exemption. This is the power that Congress wields when we grant its members far more authority than they should have.

First off, I’ve railed against the antitrust exemption before, but it’s important to understand by allowing Congress to “help” baseball in the past, major league executives are de facto telling Congress they can hurt them in the future.

When Congress establishes a system which fast tracks talented athletes through the system while gifted computer analysists are held up, we are agreeing that Congress members can help one industry and hurt another. We then don’t get to be angry when Congress members changes their minds.

This is the root problem with granting government too much power in the first place. We generally give them such authority to right a wrong and often have the best intentions in mind. However, eventually someone comes into office who doesn’t agree with prior legislation but now they have been given the power to use that cudgel in any way they see fit. We cheered when they used it to help us but, oops, now they are going to hold it over our heads unless we do as they want. This is legislative tyranny, this is not freedom.

Baseball should be allowed to run their minor league baseball teams, largely, in any way they desire. If those minor league baseball teams are unprofitable, then so be it. It’s their call whether to keep them, it cannot be the job of government. And yet it apparently is. That’s how far we’ve slipped in this country. Our elected officials believe they should have the authority to tell Major League Baseball executives how to run their farm system.

It boggles the mind.

Tom Liberman

Evander Kane Gambling Debt Illustrative

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Evander Kane Gambling

A news story just broke about a hockey played named Evander Kane and the fact he apparently owes the Cosmopolitan casino in Las Vegas half a million dollars in unpaid markers. He reportedly ran up the debt when his team, the San Jose Sharks, were playing the Las Vegas Golden Knights in the first round of the NHL playoffs in April.

I’m sure there will be many people lamenting the fact that Las Vegas, a center for gambling, now has professional sports teams when for many years the various leagues actively prevented such from happening. They will talk about the situation Kane finds himself in as a dire warning as to why athletes should not be traveling to Las Vegas on a regular basis. We will soon have a Las Vegas NFL team and it’s likely an NBA team and MLB team will eventually join them.

The idea being that athletes who end up owing large amounts of money to gambling houses are potentially corruptible. Kane might be tempted to pay off the Cosmopolitan by playing a bad game on a night when the casino had a lot of money bet on his team to win.

To me, the situation quite starkly illustrates exactly the opposite. The difference is the Cosmopolitan has a legal recourse to get Kane to repay the money. That’s the entire point of the lawsuit they’ve filed. Illegal gambling operations have no such leverage and must look for other ways to get the money back. That’s essentially the entire argument against making things like gambling illegal in the first place.

Kane would have found an outlet to place his wagers even without being in Las Vegas. I readily admit being in the location makes it easier, but athletes have been going into gambling debt long before there was an NHL team based in Las Vegas. You can’t prevent someone from gambling, so the best way to stop an athlete from becoming beholden to criminal gambling enterprises is to allow them to gamble legally. Then the casino can sue her or him for the money rather than extort it some other way.

People certainly seem to think making immoral activities illegal is a good idea but generally such laws create a far worse situation than the actual unethical actions. People are going to gamble anyway, that’s reality. The fact Kane can legally be pursued for the money the casino claims he owes makes sports safer.

Tom Liberman

The Difficulty of Opioid Testing in Professional Sports

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Opioid Testing

The recent death of Los Angeles Angles pitcher Tyler Skaggs from an overdose has led many people to call for Opioid Testing in Major League Baseball and professional sports in general. Most people seem to think Opioid Testing is a great idea. It’s my opinion those of such an opinion neglect to acknowledge the reality of professional sports and that’s what I’d like to discuss today.

The reason we sports fans get to marvel in the astounding performances of professional athletes across the athletic spectrum is because of pain management techniques including a large amount of opioid use. I well understand we’d like to believe athletes are able to put on these amazing shows night after night without the aid of pain management techniques but such is self-delusion. Top-level athletes push their bodies to the limit day after day and started doing so at a young age. They are beat up.

The way trainers get the athletes back on the field is through pain management and opioids are a big part of it. This is not something limited to professional athletes. I played baseball as a ten-year-old and I wasn’t given opioids but I got injured even then. By the time an athlete reaches high school their bodies have already been subject to enormous stresses. Team doctors give them opioids so they can get on the field and entertain us, me, the sports fan. That’s reality.

This being true, how exactly is a plan to implement opioid testing in professional sports ever going to work? If many, potentially the majority, of players are taking opioids then it becomes impossible to implement a program to test for them. There is no test that can tell the difference between heroin purchased illegally from Oxycodone prescribed by a team doctor.

It is entirely possible Skaggs got addicted to opioids because trainers started giving them to him when he first suffered significant pain from pitching and that might have been at a very young age. I have no knowledge of such a thing but it’s not difficult to imagine quite a number of professional athletes have been taking prescription opioids for a long time.

This is the price they pay to entertain us, me. So, before I get on my high horse and start calling for Opioid Testing, perhaps I should examine my role in all of this, my responsibility in their pain, addiction, and even death. Pain that will follow them throughout their lives.

I understand it is their choice to play sports, it is their choice to follow the advice of team physicians and take opioids to begin with, to potentially become addicted. I do not absolve them from responsibility but I refuse to shriek from a pretentious moral high ground.

Let’s be adults and face the reality of the situation.

Tom Liberman

The Wealth Gap between Poor and Rich in Athletics

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Wealth Gap High School Football

The wealth gap in our nation is something that a lot of people are interested in and a new dynamic, in the form of athletics, brings an interesting perspective to the debate. Essentially, wealthy schools are absolutely crushing poor schools in high school football across the country. I just read an interesting article illustrating how the various states are trying to handle the situation.

There are a number of factors driving the phenomenon including better coaching, better nutrition, better practice facilities, better weight rooms, and the fact sometimes the best athletes from poor districts have to hold down jobs rather than play sports. What cannot be argued is the math behind the wealth gap problem. Teams from poor districts lose consistently to teams from rich districts, so much so that Minnesota, Oregon, and Colorado have change the rules for scheduling matchups. More states are contemplating doing the same.

In the past it was relatively simple. The level of football was determined by the number of students in the high school. Schools with large student populations played against other schools with a similar number of students.

Here in my home town of St. Louis that plan was thoroughly upended by desegregation and private schools. The best athletes from poor districts were transferred to financially stable districts or given scholarships by private schools; destroying the balance that once existed. That’s not what’s going on here.

What’s happening is something that we should take note of as an overall trend. Kids from wealthy districts or kids with wealthy parents are gaining an advantage so steep it is becoming almost impossible to overcome. We’ve seen simple bribery in the College Admission Scandal which I wrote about before but this is something else again.

The reality of the problem is demonstrated in the final score of high school football game. It becomes impossible to deny this wealth gap issue when rich high schools absolutely crush poor high schools in a consistent and statistically irrefutable way. Count the wins. Look at the scores.

Solutions are difficult to say the least but it’s important to be willing to acknowledge the wealth gap in this country exists and is problematic. Just allowing the poor high schools to drop down in division, which is largely the various states’ solution, is not addressing the real problem. High school football is telling us something. Are we listening?

Tom Liberman

How to Stop the Miami Dolphins from Playing to Lose

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Playing to Lose

The Miami Dolphins are playing to lose and a lot of people don’t like it. The Dolphins have all but tacitly admitted they can’t make the playoffs this season and traded away their best players hoping to finish in last place and get good draft choices. This is not the first time we’ve observed such behavior and its been at least somewhat successful in the past.

The Houston Astros, Chicago Cubs, and Philadelphia 76ers have all employed the playing to lose strategy with varying degrees of success over the last decade. Many argue there is little that can be done to stop such behavior despite the obvious negatives associated with it. Mainly the players lose years out of very short careers and the fans have to sit through seasons of inept play with the hopes of victory at some undefined future point which sometimes never comes.

The way to change this behavior is simply to understand why it is being implemented in the first place. Teams try to lose because they will get better draft choices. The way sports leagues work in Canada and United States, but nowhere else in the world, is through drafts in which players are enslaved, that is say drafted, by a single employer and cannot negotiate with any other team. The worst teams draft first and the best teams draft last. I wrote about why the system is a Libertarian Hell already, please take a look at that article to understand the immorality of the system. Today I’m going to talk about how abolishing it also eliminates playing to lose.

Well, honestly, I don’t really have to do much explaining. If all players joining the professional ranks for the first time are allowed to shop their services to whatever team is willing to meet their price, there is no playing to lose. With a salary cap imposed by the various leagues it is up to each team to give the best contract to the player who will help her or his team the most. It’s done this way in college and across the world, so don’t fill my comments with suggestions on how it won’t work.

The best running back would certainly be incentivized to sign with a team that is in need of a running back and vice versa. This is the way it works for every other person first entering the work force and for all other businesses in the world.

Don’t like teams playing to lose? The solution is simple and ethically right. Win and win.

Tom Liberman

Fair Pay to Play Exposes NCAA Hypocrisy

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Fair Pay to Play

There is a fairly big news story involving the Fair Pay to Play bill just passed by the California Legislature. I think there’s a great deal of confusion about the bill which the NCAA and Tim Tebow so virulently oppose. Let me explain it in simple terms. The Fair Pay to Play bill does not force colleges to pay athletes, it simply allows said athletes to sell their autographs, images, and likenesses. That’s it. All the hubbub Tebow and the NCAA are wailing about is simply athletes being allowed to sell their autographs and images.

Let me be even more clear. Right now, those athletes are forbidden from selling their own autograph! They cannot sell a picture of themselves but the NCAA does it all the time. Autographed memorabilia are auctioned off by the schools and the NCAA all the time. The school administrators, coaches, assistant coaches, trainers, and everyone else associated with the games profit off the name, images, and likeness of the players. Everyone except the players themselves.

The NCAA disgusts me and long has done so. I’ve written about this before. Now I’ll add Tebow to the list of people who profit off college football while insisting the players get nothing. I’m not sure how much more hypocritical it can get. How people can justify not allowing anyone to sell their autograph and image is beyond my comprehension. Nothing is more personal. Nothing is a greater natural right. My image is mine to do with as I wish as is yours.

You don’t have to be a die-hard Libertarian like myself to respect the individual’s right to sell her or his own autograph. No one else is prohibited from doing so except so-called amateur athletes. Not only is the bill not unconstitutional, as the NCAA and Tebow claim, it is the rules that prohibit it that are unconstitutional. How the NCAA has gotten away with this for so long is an indictment of our judicial branch and an assault on freedom. How is it that a law needs to be passed to allow people to sell their own autograph? That’s the real question.

Unconstitutional? Unconstitutional? You’re unconstitutional! You’re unconstitutional. The whole trial is unconstitutional. That sick, crazy, and depraved NCAA is stealing from those athletes and they’d like to keep doing it!

Tom Liberman

Did the Cleveland Browns Ban the Wrong Fan?

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Browns Ban

In the first weekend of the NFL season the Cleveland Browns were demolished by the Tennessee Titans by a score of 43-13 and a fan dumped beer on one of the Titans players during the blowout. They looked into the incident and the Browns ban was announced. Now it appears they may have identified the wrong person and are backtracking on the Browns ban. I find their most recent reply to be lacking in an interesting way. I’ll get into that in a moment but first the incident in question.

There are videos and images of the beer pour and the offending fan is being universally panned. From these pieces of evidence, the Browns thought they had identified the culprit. They called him and informed him that he was banned from the stadium. The fan who was called, Eric Smith, told a Browns executive that he was not at the game but was DJing a public event. The executive insisted they had matched a tattoo although in images of the incident the offending fan appears not to have a tattoo. Both men are bearded to the Brown’s credit.

Here’s where it gets fairly interesting for me. It’s quite possible that Smith owned a ticket in the vicinity of the alleged beer dumping and his beard and general appearance led the team to think they had the right person and implement the Browns ban. That’s all well and good although perhaps they should have been more careful before making the call to Smith. Mistakes do happen. It’s the latest reply from the Browns public relations staff that bothers me. I’ll include it here.

Our investigation of the fan incident on Sunday at FirstEnergy Stadium remains ongoing. While we are continuing to gather information and have been in contact with multiple people as part of that process, we have not explicitly identified the individual involved or taken any formal action of punishment at this time. We will have no further comment until the investigation is complete.

This is the sort of mealy-mouthed half-truth I abhor. Perhaps the Browns didn’t official name the fan nor officially implement the ban but the pragmatic reality is the fan has been identified and was told of the banning. Why couldn’t the Browns issue a simple explanation? We thought we had the right person but, in our haste, may have made a mistake. We are continuing the investigation. How difficult is that?

We all make mistakes but it is our reluctance to admit them that leads to far more problems than anything else. We need look no further than the current political climate where a simple mistake in regards to what state would be hit by a hurricane has led us down a path of lies, denials, half-truths, and partisan insanity.

Tom Liberman

Antonio Brown and the NFL Helmet Kerfuffle

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NFL Helmet Antonio Brown

There’s in an interesting situation in the NFL involving wide receiver Antonio Brown’s desire to wear the NFL Helmet of his choice rather than that mandated by the league. Until this season the players were allowed to wear whatever helmet they wanted but new rules only allow certified NFL helmets to be used. Brown wants to wear the same helmet he’s worn for his entire career but the league prohibits doing so and therefore he is filing legal injunctions against the league.

Certainly, the league has the prerogative to dictate uniform requirements. Their new rules affected a number of players in the league including Tom Brady who has expressed displeasure with the situation but so far complied. To fully understand the situation, we have to delve more deeply into the history of the league and the nature of Chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE) and the role concussions play in it.

CTE is a terrible disease which seems to occur largely in athletes who play contact sports like boxing, football, ice hockey, and others. Players suffering from the symptoms of the disease and other difficulties sued the league and have won more than a billion dollars in various settlements to date. The league long denied any connection between brain injury and repeated concussions despite strong evidence suggesting otherwise.

The motivation for the change is clear. The league wants to do everything in their power to defend themselves from future lawsuit but also to protect players by using NFL helmets believed to be best for preventing head injuries.

It seems clear Brown should want to use a better helmet for his own self-interest but it must be remembered hockey players long fought against having to wear helmets and facemasks including even goalies. They didn’t feel comfortable in the new equipment and thought it impaired their ability to perform. People often do things that are largely self-destructive and what is the role of an employer in preventing such behavior? That’s essentially the question with which we are dealing.

I think the NFL helmet rule is perfectly reasonable. They are a private entity making uniform rules for their employees. If the same thing was being forced on the NFL by a government agency, I might well have a different opinion on the subject. In addition, the right to wear whatever NFL helmet you want is not protected by the Constitution of the United States so the league does not fall afoul of that important document.

As a Libertarian I sympathize with Brown. I think it’s unfortunate he doesn’t get to wear the helmet of his choice but the reasons his employer are enforcing new rules are more than compelling, even if the new helmets prove ineffective in preventing brain injury.

Tom Liberman

Shai Werts and the Bird Shit Cocaine

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Shai Werts

A young man named Shai Werts who plays football for Georgia Southern was arrested for cocaine possession the other day and the entire thing gives me yet another chance to rant against the so-called War on Drugs. The entire episode illustrates how police use the War on Drugs to persecute those they don’t like, which, I’m sure you’ll find shocking, is most often minorities.

Here’s what happened. Werts was supposedly speeding on a secluded road and an officer tried to pull him over. Werts was uncomfortable in the situation, called 911, and drove to a more populated location followed by police. When he did pull over, he explained why he didn’t stop immediately.

Our finest officers then scraped bird shit off his car hood, put it in their field kits, claimed it tested positive as cocaine, and arrested him. Werts told the officers it was bird shit but they weren’t going to put up with that excuse. Later, when subjected to a real laboratory test, the substance turned out not to be cocaine, what a surprise.

Here’s what really happened. A young black man was rightly afraid for his life when the police pulled him over for speeding. That alone is sad testament to the reality in which we live. He was also likely afraid they’d plant drugs on him because that is also a reality of the world. So, he forced the officers to follow him to a less secluded location. That pissed off the officers. They decided they wanted to punish him. They found the flimsiest of excuses to harass him. Did the bird shit actually test positive in the field kit? Who knows, field kits and drug sniffing dogs are notoriously unreliable.

This situation was simply officers abusing their authority to harass someone who did something they didn’t like. If you’re a minority living in this country, you aren’t at all surprised by this. If you’re not a minority you probably don’t even believe it happens, you’re mad at me, and will write nasty comments about how I hate police.

This is the War on Drugs. An excuse to harass citizens, steal from them, put them in prison, and be a general bully. This behavior has effectively alienated law enforcement from the communities they are trying to serve. I’ve written before how this is a tragic situation both for citizens and police so I won’t reiterate.

What does it say when police scrape bird shit off the hood of a car in order to harass people they don’t like? What does it say that we put up with drug detecting field kits that mistake bird shit for cocaine, that is if we don’t just assume the officers were lying?

Close your eyes to the travesty that is the War on Drugs and reap the consequences.

Tom Liberman

Reggie Bush and the Detroit Lions Cheap Misleading Headline

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Reggie Bush Misleading Headline

An article from Lions Wire, a news outlet associated with the NFL’s Detroit Lions, claims: Reggie Bush takes shot at Lions, calls them cheap. Is it true or is just typical clickbait nonsense? I’m guessing you might already know the answer because this is an article in my Misleading Headline series but I’ll go ahead and finish the job.

The story is relatively simple. There was an image displaying Bush and fellow running back Joique Bell celebrating as teammates on the Detroit Lions. Bush tweeted the image with his own comment that “And then we got cut because they wanted to go cheaper.” It’s a factually true statement. The Lions were interested in cutting payroll because of the salary cap demands in the NFL. They drafted younger players and cut both Bush and Bell.

The move didn’t work out particularly well for the Lions in that the new running backs were not nearly as productive as Bush and Bell. That is somewhat beside the point. Bush didn’t say the Lions were cheap. He said they made a football decision based on payroll. Nor do I even think it was much of a shot at the Lions.

I can’t know for sure what Bush was thinking but I imagine he saw the picture and remembered the next season he was cut from the team in a payroll savings move and commented accurately upon this fact. Maybe he is bitter about it but, in this case, I think he was merely stating a fact rather than taking a shot at anyone.

Tom Liberman

Saint Louis Blues and Soccer Players Behaving Badly

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Blues

Recently, the sporting world brought us St. Louis Blues fans a Stanley Cup Championship and the soccer world in general the ongoing Women’s World Cup. A couple of incidents involving the Blues and U.S. Women’s National Team got me to thinking about bad behavior and our reaction to it.

First my hometown St. Louis Blues are up. They won the Stanley Cup for the first time in their existence and there was a large parade in downtown St. Louis with an enormous crowd. When the various dignitaries and players made their victory speeches on stage it was largely a slurring, expletive filled affair. This with a young Blues fan on the stage and many more in the audience.

Meanwhile, the USWNT won their 2019 World Cup Debut in overwhelming fashion defeating a badly overmatched Thailand team 13-0. As the score mounted so did the celebrations of the players after each goal to the point it became, as with the slurring and swearing Blues players, distasteful.

Were the Blues vile and disgusting in their words and actions? Were the USWNT players gross and unsporting in theirs? That’s the question I ask today. The answer is nuanced. The Blues won the Stanley Cup and have well-earned the right to celebrate any way they desire. The USWNT defeated an opponent by a large amount and have every right to enjoy each goal with whatever enthusiasm they want. However, I have every right to find both instances distasteful.

My opinion is mine to have and their actions are theirs to take. That’s the main point here. Some people found the celebrations to be perfectly acceptable and reasonable and they can absolutely think that way. It doesn’t change my opinion of events; no do I expect to change anyone else’s mind with my own thoughts. I think what I think.

I’m certainly open to hearing why people didn’t find the celebrations offensive. They can try to convince me all they want but they can’t tell me how to think, that’s my job. Just as I can’t tell the players how to behave on stage or on the field of play. I can’t tell you how to think, I can only present my thoughts on the subject, if you find them persuasive that’s great, if not, that’s fine also.

It’s a big person world out there and you’re not going to find everyone’s opinions or actions to your liking. Go right ahead and tell them you don’t like it but don’t expect them to change.

Yes, I found both instances unsavory. I don’t approve of the actions of the soccer players or the hockey players. That’s me.

Tom Liberman

Why Call it an All-Star Game when Fans Vote?

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All-Star Game

The title of the blog pretty much sums up my question. If we’re going to call it an All-Star Game, then why are we letting fans vote for the players? This is a situation that caught my attention even when I was a young boy while filling out All-Star Ballots at Busch Stadium for my beloved home town St. Louis Cardinals. I would vote for who I thought was the best player at each position but most of the people around me voted for all Cardinals.

It comes to my attention again because in the International League, a Triple A affiliate of Major League Baseball, an outfielder with an average of .155, 1 home run, 14 runs batted in, who is at the bottom of the league in four offensive statistics, and is also a pretty poor defensive player has a chance to make the team. His name, you won’t be surprised to learn, is Tim Tebow.

I don’t mean to pick on Tebow here. It’s certainly not his fault people are voting for him. Nor am I particularly upset at the fans who are doing so. They want to see Tebow in the All-Star game and are making their decision known. This is the same reason Paige Spiranac keeps getting invites to LPGA events. My question is that which I’ve stated already, why call it an All-Star game when it’s a popular election?

If the fans want to see Tebow and Spiranac, more power to them. There’s nothing wrong with doing it that way. The fan votes in the International League are not the final arbiter but count only as a percentage of the final decision as to whom to include. In the Major League All-Star game, the fans only choose the starters, the managers pick the rest of the lineup.

Still, the fact we call it an All-Star game bothers me. All-Star would specify the best players in the league, the stars. Anything that includes a fan vote is most likely going to be more of a popularity contest than an actual showcase of the league’s most talented players. Not to say there isn’t a great deal of overlap, just that the two are clearly not the same.

Every year older players in the twilight of their career make the team instead of their younger and statistical superior counterparts. This observation of mine is nothing earth shattering.

The Most-Popular Game doesn’t quite have the mystique of the All-Star game but has the advantage of being closer to the truth.

What do you think?

Should we call it the Most-Popular Game instead of All-Star Game?

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Tom Liberman

Steve Stricker and the Dmitrii Donskoi a Tale of Two Scams

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Stricker

I recently read a pair of articles one involving Steve Stricker and the other a Russian ship named the Dmitrii Donskoi I think illustrate the difference between a fool and a victim. Both stories involve scam artists taking money from people but there is a fundamental difference in my opinion of those who fell for the tricks.

Stricker is a notable golfer who is captain of this year’s Ryder Cup team. A con-artists contacted a charity hosting a golf tournament and promised them that Stricker, his cousin, would be happy to attend and support the organization. The golf course and the charity accepted the story and promoted the event. People paid $7,500 to support the charity and spend time with Stricker. Unfortunately, Stricker knew nothing of the event and the con-artist skipped town with the money.

Back in 1905 a Russian fleet was sent to the Pacific in order to support Russian activity in the region and the Dmitrii Donskoi, an armored cruiser built in the 1880s, was part of that armada. She was sunk near an island in what is now South Korea. Back in 1999 a South Korean construction company in financial trouble claimed they had found the wreck and that it had on it 200 tons of gold coins. The share price of the company went up briefly but the claim was found to be false.

Recently another South Korean company, this a treasure hunting business, made the same claim about the Dmitrii Donskoi. They collected millions of dollars from investors and their stock price rose precipitously. As like the first claim, nothing came of it and investors were out large sums of money.

What do these two scam incidents have in common? Victims. People paid money to the charity in order to play with Stricker. People paid money for stocks and invested money in the hopes of recouping their cash and more. In both cases people lost their money.

Here is the difference. The charity event and the golf course promoting Stricker’s appearance made claims that were not unreasonable. I’m certain Stricker does attend such events over the course of the year. Fans expectation of seeing Stricker were reasonable. Certainly, the charity and the golf course should have done more diligence in ensuring Stricker was going to attend but the individuals who paid to see Stricker, and were scammed, behaved reasonable. I feel bad for them.

Meanwhile the Dmitrii Donskoi was never purported to have any gold on it and there was absolutely no reason to suspect it might. It was an older ship, slow and vulnerable, being sent into a war zone. The Russian government, if they needed to transfer gold, could have done it by rail with significantly greater ease. The amount of gold claimed to be aboard the Dmitrii Donskoi was equivalent to ten percent of all the gold mined in the history of the planet. The idea that there was, or is, gold aboard the wreck is patently ridiculous and anyone who spends ten minutes researching the project can learn this fact quite easily. I have no sympathy for any fool that fell for this scam.

The sad part is both scams will most certainly be used again. I suspect unwise, gold mad, morons will be pumping money into the pockets of con-artists mentioning the Dmitrii Donskoi. I also imagine that charities and their donators will be duped.

Not that it much matters, but idiots need not apply for my sympathy. For all others, I’m sorry some asshole used your good intentions to steal your money.

Tom Liberman

Hockey Fights are Long Overdue for Termination

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Hockey Fights

I know most fans cheer on hockey fights and there was a time when I at least tolerated them even if I didn’t jump out of my seat and root them on. That time is over. Way past over. We don’t tolerate such bare-fisted fighting in any other sport, even boxing and Mixed Martial Arts. We certainly call such fighting assault when it happens in a bar or on the street. It’s a crime there and it should be on the ice as well.

The horrific fight between Alex Ovechkin and Andrei Svechnikov in the playoff game between the Washington Capitals and the Carolina Hurricanes illustrates the point. The video that’s being seen far and wide on every sports station and most regular news channels shows Ovechkin knocking Svechnikov out with a vicious punch to the face.

I’ve long been opposed to fighting in hockey and the game itself is slowly coming around to that point of view. There are fewer fights every year in the NHL and that’s a good thing. The players are more aware of the dangers of such violence to their future careers and even lives and more and more reluctant to engage in such behavior. All that is needed now is for the league to met out long suspensions for anyone who engages in hockey fights.

Frankly, if you watch a playoff game or even games in the regular season it’s filled with players punching one another with gloves on, shoving their fists in the face of other players, grabbing the face of opponents with open palms, and general stick work that is both dangerous and unnecessary.

Listen, I played hockey as a kid. I got into one fight when an opposing player hit me in the neck with his stick. It was exhilarating. I get it. I understand why people like it and why players engage in such behavior. That doesn’t make it right.

The reality is that it is not needed. Hockey is a great sport, fast paced, tremendously skilled players, action, and hard checks. The fighting is wrong, plain and simple. I’m not going to get into some logical debate about why trying to punch someone else into unconsciousness, even if both parties are willing, is wrong. It is. That’s the bottom line. I’m sick of seeing it and you should be as well.

You can claim I’m ruining the manly nature of the sport. Call me a wimp and a loser. I don’t care. Hockey fights were wrong back then and they are wrong today. Let’s put an end to them once and for all.

Tom Liberman

Lakers Superfan Happy to See Team Lose Misleading Headline

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Lakers Superfan Misleading Headline

I just read a fascinating article about a fellow named Jimmy Goldstein who is identified as a Lakers Superfan in a Misleading Headline about the Los Angeles Lakers missing the playoffs for the sixth season in a row. The problem is that Goldstein is not a Lakers fan at all, although he loves NBA basketball, claiming to spend nearly half a million dollars a year traveling around the country to see various games.

The implication of the Misleading Headline is that Goldstein wants to see the Lakers miss the playoffs perhaps because he doesn’t like the current coach, because he thinks LeBron James was not a good acquisition, or is unhappy with the direction ownership is taking the team. At least that’s what I thought when I was baited into clicking on the article and perusing it.

It turns out Goldstein, who has had courtside season tickets to the Lakers since 1962, doesn’t like the team and enjoys watching them lose. He hasn’t had much to be cheerful about since the Lakers moved to the City of Angels all those years ago as they’ve been arguably the most successful franchise in the league. So, he’s enjoying the current losing streak immensely and pointedly says that: Lakers fans deserve it.

Now, I certainly question Goldstein going to all those games if he doesn’t like the Lakers. Even if they were a horrible team it seems like an odd way to spend your time. I certainly wouldn’t want to watch games at Wrigley Field for the rest of my life whilst rooting against the Cubs, even if they lost most of the time, a practice I hope they resume again soon. Still, he’s a big NBA fan who lives in Los Angeles and so attends the games. That’s his business. Odd as it seems to me.

In the end, the Misleading Headline should not have called Goldstein a Lakers superfan.

Tom Liberman

Why Did a Man Like Robert Kraft Solicit a Prostitute?

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Robert Kraft

A fellow by the name of Robert Kraft who has a few billion dollars to his name and owns the 2018 Super Bowl Champion New England Patriots was taped by police in a brothel with a prostitute. Out and about at my gym and in the general public the question on everyone’s lips seems to be: Why would such a man pay for an $80 sex act from a prostitute?

The conversations I’ve overheard generally follow a similar line. Kraft is a billionaire in a high-profile position in life and probably has his pick and choice of willing women, besides his wife, who would be happy to give him sexual satisfaction. What possible motivation could he have for seeking gratification at such a place? Then those having the conversation proceed to speculate on any number of reasons why it happened. Perhaps he likes taking risks. Perhaps he likes Asian women. Perhaps he wanted to be caught. The possibilities go on and on but I have a simple answer.

Kraft did it because he wanted to do it. It’s his business and none of mine and none of yours. This is not coming from some Patriots fan-boi, believe me. This is coming from a Libertarian perspective that understands the problems with laws against prostitution as a whole.

The reason Kraft was caught by the police is the establishment in question is accused of bringing women from Asian countries to the United States under false pretenses and forcing them to work in the sex trade. This is a problem but it’s an issue largely created by making prostitution illegal in the first place.

If prostitution was not against the law, women who were so treated would likely go to the police as quickly as they could. If the sex trade was established like Starbucks then it would be regulated and managed by our judicial branch and their law enforcement arm. Personally, I think Kraft desiring sexual gratification for $80 makes more sense than his spending $8.00 for a cup of coffee but if he wants to do either it’s just not my business.

It’s important to understand that legalizing prostitution will not stop people from being exploited. There is no single solution to the world’s ills. The best strategy is to implement a pragmatic and realistic solution that will create as good a situation as possible. In this particular case, the Libertarian issue with Kraft soliciting prostitutes is that the women were potentially doing something against their will. If they were happy to take Kraft’s money and provide him with sexual gratification then it is not my business, it’s not your business, and it certainly should not be the business of the state.

Why did a man like Kraft solicit prostitutes? Stop caring and you’ll make the world a better place.

Tom Liberman

Sports Gambling Experts and the Tricks they Use

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Sports Gambling

The prohibition against Sports Gambling was lifted by the Supreme Court not long ago and a number of states have already started to allow such betting with many more planning to do so. I thought I’d take this opportunity to talk about a Confidence Game that Sports Gambling experts rely upon to relieve you of your money.

If you listen to Sports Talk Radio or watch it on television you will eventually come across a number of shows in which a gambler claims to be willing to sell you the guaranteed winner of certain games each week. He or she generally offers a free sample to prove how accurate are her or his predictions. It’s a relatively simple little trick but before I explain let me give you an example of how attractive it sounds.

Let’s say I make an absolute guarantee of victory and you fill out the required form. I send you my winner of the week. Imagine it turns out to be right. You’d be not much impressed I imagine. Anyone can get a game right. It’s essentially a 50% chance. Either the team I predicts covers the spread or they don’t. However, you’re intrigued. Let’s try again you might say to yourself. This could be easy money.

You try it a second time and I’m right again! Ok, this is getting serious. I might actually know what I’m doing. You’re a cautious person though and you want to test it a few more times. You’re so cautious you test it six times and each time I’m correct. Now you are willing to shell out a few hundred bucks to get a guaranteed winner, right? I mean, yes, you have to pay for the winner but you can gamble much more money and win it all back. Easy money!

What’s the trick? As I said, it’s not too difficult. Basically, each week I send out groups of predictions rather than single predictions. That is to say I don’t send a free sample of the same game to everyone who inquires. Instead I send out one of ten games randomly to each person. Each time I do so I risk being wrong 50% of the time. That means one out of every sixty-four, or two percent, of the people I send my predictions to will get the correct winner six weeks in a row.

I send these out to tens of thousands if not millions of people. Two percent of the people, if they required six straight corrects, will subscribe to my service. Let’s be conservative and imagine I send out these samples to 10,000 people a week. That means two-hundred people will send me their hundreds of dollars in return for my prediction, per week. Eventually they might become disenchanted but many will require less “proof” and many will remain loyal. This is a lucrative business opportunity, much better than actually betting on sporting events.

That’s the entirety of the trick. You can thank me by purchasing one, or more, of my novels. They’re only $2.99 and you might enjoy reading them. Even if you think it sucks, you’ll be out less money than if you listened to Sports Gambling Experts.

Tom Liberman